Most of the ideas about nuclear energy were developed in European countries. When World War II broke out in 1939, there were efforts in Britain and Germany to develop an atomic bomb. However, it took the wealth and technology of the USA after they entered the war in December 1941 to develop the first of those bombs. As part of the Manhattan Project, the USA used its best scientists and some from other countries to set off the first explosion of a nuclear bomb in the desert of New Mexico. The success of this experiment led to dropping the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, in August 1945 (See p. 313).
1. Powder charge is fired
2. Powder charge sent uranium ‘bullet’ through gun barrel
3. The uranium ‘bullet’ crashed into larger amount of uranium, creating a nuclear chain reaction which exploded the bomb
Powder charge
Uranium ‘bullet’ hole
Gun barrel
Larger uranium charge
A cross-section of Little Boy, which was dropped on Hiroshima 1
2 3 The dropping of the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki helped bring about the end
of World War II in the East. They resulted in huge numbers of deaths in Japan, and vast destruction. But they also saved an unknown number of US and Allied lives, which would have been lost if they had been forced to invade Japan.
